As the demonization of Vladimir Putin gets ever more intense in the western media, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov says that in fact public opinion polls show he is loved in many “different countries.”

Peskov gave RT some details behind the statements in Putin’s
address to the Federal Assembly.

RT:During the speech Vladimir Putin seemed
very ambitious. There were loads of plans laid out to raise
industry, to raise small businesses, to raise medium sized
businesses and this isn’t the first time he’s called on the
government to help do that. Why is it different this time?

Dmitry Peskov: It’s different very much due to
the international environment.

First of all, the president has emphasized that Russia is an open
country that would never, by its own will, stay in international
isolation. Russia will continue to stay open for international
investments, for international cooperation, and Russia is
extremely interested in that cooperation. But at the same time,
unfortunately we don’t see every time a reciprocal approach from
our western partners, and to the contrary we witness lots of
attempts to interfere in our domestic affairs, lots of attempts
not to create, let’s say, joint win, win situations, but win-lose
situations. And the losing party in their understanding should
every time be Russia.

Plus as well as that he mentioned sanctions, entire Russia
sanctions and he said that sanctions were not a consequence of
the crisis in Ukraine, but these sanctions or whatever else could
just be a pretext for an attempt to stop Russia regaining its
power, regaining its global positions, and in these circumstances
the president has emphasized that we have to rely on our own
capabilities and our own talents.

And in this context, actually, he scheduled a plan of support for
domestic business, a plan for a different set of measures that
should be implemented. Of course before they are implemented,
they should be formulated so they are more precise and this
should be done by the government in the coming days.

RT:About the rhetoric, about the US and the
West trying to contain Russia. President Obama recently said that
President Putin is scaring the heck out of his EU neighbors,
isn’t that a serious rhetorical escalation?

DP: It is in our understanding – this is too
much, actually. This is too much, this attempt to demonize Putin.
It’s an unfair display with domestic public opinion. We think
this is one more attempt to demonize him and at the same time,
every day we see growing support, popular support, support of
public opinion in those particular countries. So then this is
contradicted every day, and the contradiction is [growing] more
and more between public opinion in those countries and the words
of their leaders. This is a very interesting situation.

RT:As you say, there is a growing
demonization of Putin in Western media, especially like never
before, but is there such a thing as bad publicity, because it is
publicity after all, isn’t it?

DP: As a matter of fact, I don’t think Putin
needs any publicity, whether it is bad or good. He is the
President of Russia, which is being actually loved by lots of
people throughout the world in very different countries. And we
know that because we see the statistics from different countries,
we see the media materials coming from different countries and
people really do love him.